Persistence
by Hermia S
Summary: It's the first word that comes to mind when Varric explains the relationship between Junior and the Rivaini. (Fifty sentences detailing the various ups and downs [and horizontals] of Carver and Isabela's decade-long affair.)


#01 – **Walking**  
Carver's stride is unlike anything she has ever seen, like a large man convinced he's trapped inside the body of a small man, when in truth his shadow stretches far beyond those around him.

#02 – **Waltz**  
"I dunno how you do it," Carver tells her once, whetstone in hand and a curious look in his eyes, "how you make fighting look like dancing, like you don't weigh anything."

#03 – **Wishes**  
The caprice is still warm from his sister's palm and heavier than any coin should be, but he casts it into the fountain all the same, thinking he's too old for Orlesian games.

#04 – **Wonder**  
"You would hate it," Isabela murmurs after an explicit retelling of her last Satinalia spent in Antiva; Carver doesn't say anything, but all he can think is that the noise and the people and the week-long feasts might not be so bad if he spent them with her.

#05 – **Worry**  
When Isabela asks Anders about the Joining, his expression reflects every fear that has crept up on her since she got the news.

#06 – **Whimsy**  
Yards of silk separate the line of Carver's jaw from her skin – an expensive, but necessary indulgence to distract her from the thrill in her gut when he crawls so close.

#07 – **Waste/Wasteland**  
"I'm going to be finding sand between my breasts for weeks," Isabela says with a sad sigh only a few minutes' walk into the Vimmark Mountains; the mournful sound only turns into a laugh with Carver's eager offer of help her clean up.

#08 - **Whiskey and rum**  
Even before she is introduced to Hawke, she spots Carver in the Hanged Man, laughing and cursing at Varric in equal measure; even in those moments, when he's an awkwardly-proportioned face and enormous muscles without a name, she thinks, "Now there's a boy I could share the _good_ stuff with."

#09 – **War**  
He hasn't spoken or written to her in months, not since the Fereldan Grey Wardens moved into Jader; she searches for an excuse to dock her ship and travel into Orlais and finds only one, but it's not good enough.

#10 – **Weddings**  
"I can't believe she's marrying that limp-wristed Orlesian bastard," Carver mutters, arms folded over his chest; Isabela curls her fingers around his bicep and wonders aloud if he's only jealous he didn't find a woman to marry first, her devious laughter only silenced with a pointed kiss.

#11 – **Birthday**  
"On this, Junior's twelfth – excuse me, _twentieth_ nameday, I couldn't be happier to say he's well on his way to being a second-rate hero in his own right," Varric cheers with a mug of beer in his raised hand, grinning at both Carver and the rogue in his lap.

#12 – **Blessing**  
Standing on the dock in front of her new ship, Carver hands her a pendant strung on a thin silver chain, murmuring a quiet, "Fair winds and following seas," against her hair; he's leaving again, but this time, she is, too.

#13 –** Bias**  
Everyone playing in Fenris' diamondback games swears Isabela cheats on Carver's behalf, leaning over his shoulder and eying his cards the way she does; the accusations only earn them a shake of her head and a laugh, saying, "Trust me, it flusters him even more than it does you."

#14 – **Burning**  
"The whole city's gone tits up, and you've got somewhere else to go?" Isabela barely manages to ask before Carver smiles at her, a rueful thing that shows just how much he would rather stay.

#15 - **Breathing**  
She tells him to hold his breath as her arms snake around his middle, moments before she hauls him beneath the water; with only a single gasp of air to sustain him, she introduces him to the cool, clean depths she often calls her one and only love.

#16 – **Breaking**  
The way Carver's chin puckers when she is finally able to offer her condolences nearly tears her heart in two, and while he doesn't cry, he cannot say a word once he feels her hand rub a comforting circle over his lower back.

#17 – **Belief**  
_One day, I'll leave_, Isabela tells herself every time she steals an afternoon at the docks; she tells herself this so often the thought becomes a truth, but the truth remains a lie.

#18 – **Balloon**  
It takes Hawke only seven months to grow to the point of bursting; it takes Isabela a solid year to wash off the thought of motherhood, though she spoils the little princess with every spare coin she has and then some.

#19 – **Balcony**  
"Dare you to spit on him," is a challenge Isabela cannot possibly turn from, even if explaining to Hawke why the nice templar all but chased her down once he glanced up towards the second story is more difficult than it should be with all the laughing.

#20 – **Bane**  
The look Isabela gives Hawke when the woman hands her a recently purchased tunic forces Carver to bite his lip to keep from laughing; it's her utterly disgusted, "A _collar_?" that nearly pushes him over the edge, whining quietly and wiping at the tears in his eyes.

#21 - **Quiet**  
He's nowhere near as loud as the men and women she's had in the past; he's all grunts and heavy breaths no matter how quickly the both of them move, and she likes it that way.

#22 - **Quirks**  
A hand brushing Carver's ribs is all it takes to send him sprawling away on Isabela's bed, a kneejerk reaction to a surprising (and adorable) weakness she's more than willing to abuse.

#23 - **Question**  
"Let me get this straight: the only time you've ever been on a ship was piled into one with a hundred souls when escaping from the Blight?" Isabela asks, water lapping at the soles of her boots; all it takes is Carver rolling his eyes for her to reach over and ruffle his hair with a promise she will stow him away one day.

#24 - **Quarrel**  
Hawke could hardly hear herself think over the two arguing louder than the noise in Lowtown at her back, the subject of discussion shifting between how to properly clean leather and which of them snored and just why either of them bothered with the other; only when Carver ground out a, "Fine, Isabela, you're right on all accounts if it means you'll leave me alone," did the 'conversation' peter out to nothing but the pirate's triumphant humming.

#25 - **Quitting**  
"Walk away, Carver," Isabela says, her voice low and warning despite the scrape of her throat; his hands leave her hips, he blinks until the earnest look in his eyes is gone, and he leaves her in her room at the Hanged Man wondering just when cutting ties became so difficult.

#26 – **Jump**  
Isabela nearly lurches out of her skin when Hawke's magic nearly crumbles the rocks around them and hopes beyond hope that staying close to Carver might save her from a cave-in.

#27 – **Jester  
**For a woman who can find a giggle in anything, she never laughs quite like she does with Carver around, though most of the time her amusement is at his expense.

#28 – **Jousting**  
"Well, he's certainly got an impressive lance," is Isabela's only response to Varric's idle imaginings of the pup competing in knightly games.

#29 – **Jewel**  
When Carver grasps Isabela's ass in one of his hands and calls it the most spectacular booty on that side of the Waking Sea, she lets out a squeal of delight and doesn't protest, despite knowing better.

#30 –** Just**  
"You were just _standing _there, leaning over," Isabela says, grinning despite herself, "It was only right that I give your bottom a good slap."

#31 – **Smirk**  
By the hundredth time, Carver resigns himself to never asking Isabela to stop smirking at him ever again; his belly-aching only serves to make it worse anyway.

#32 – **Sorrow**  
Varric's had an influence on her, she realizes, laying on a cold stone floor in Seheron; her imagination has never branched out from the bedroom before, but that doesn't stop her from wondering what Carver would say if he was there to clean her busted lip.

#33 – **Stupidity**  
Isabela laughs when Varric assures her that Junior isn't dense enough to think she might settle down with him, and it takes Carver biting his tongue to stop him from disagreeing; there's no use in proving them wrong this time.

#34 – **Serenade**  
"Don't," Isabela laughs the moment Carver opens his mouth, "Just don't and spare yourself the embarrassment, sweet thing; I've never met a Hawke who could carry a tune, not even in a bucket made of solid steel."

#35 – **Sarcasm**  
The first time Carver uses her sharpest weapon of choice against her, she's bent over a secure chest and cursing at it; the lockpick doesn't do much good once its deflected off of his armor and lost in the dirt, but she's more than happy to accept defeat in this case.

#36 – **Sordid**  
"Just... just keep it in your pants," is the only warning Hawke gives Carver when he bursts into Gamlen's house with Isabela on his arm; she waves her hands dismissively in front of her face, "I wouldn't mind you scarring Gamlen, but I fear for mother's health if she walks in on you bending her over the desk."

#37 – **Soliloquy**  
"I know I'm not much good when it comes to talking to you, just hear me out," Carver says once he scrounges up what remains of his courage after his previous dismissal; his heart is racing and his stomach is in knots, but he's able to look her in the eye when delivering his last ditch attempt to get her to understand how he feels, "I love you."

#38 – **Sojourn**  
On days when Carver claims he's gone to the Gallows to train with the templars, Hawke often finds him knocking sand out of his boots, cheeks red from the sun and not a blush; she doesn't mind the lies, but she does wonder if she should thank Isabela for keeping him occupied.

#39 – **Share**  
With every new shout and every accusatory finger pointed between Hawke and Anders, she passes Carver her flask, but neither of them are able to get drunk enough to make sense of the argument.

#40 – **Solitary**  
For months upon months, Carver feels like an outcast in the Wardens; he's a Fereldan whose heart and head is in Kirkwall, and he's too stubborn to let her go.

#41 – **Nowhere**  
Carver asks about her heading one night when his chin rests on her stomach and he doesn't have the energy to open his eyes, and Isabela doesn't know how to answer him other than a quiet, "Anywhere... once I have a means to get there."

#42 – **Neutral**  
"You're all... shades of tan and white," says Isabela as she winds the turquoise scarf around Carver's neck with a smile, knowing full well he would never wear the thing unless she made a fuss.

#43 – **Nuance**  
Isabela is ten shades of brazen until Sebastian or Fenris or even Anders drops the topic of slavery into her lap unbidden; Carver notices the change – the rough edge to her voice, the stiff line of her back – but never asks why, willing to wait for Isabela to haul the truth ashore herself.

#44 –** Near**  
She jumps into his arms the moment she's close enough; the momentum knocks him a step back, but he stands his ground, curling his arms around her waist just as sure as her legs lock around his.

#45 – **Natural**  
Hawke's little brother is all surprises and callused hands, warm breath on her neck, and a twitch in her thighs to match the pleasurable burn in the pit of her stomach; the realization that he acts like a lamb and fucks like a lion intrigues Isabela more than anything has in years.

#46 – **Horizon**  
She has too many curves to be the line where the sky meets the sea, but if there ever was a direction enticing enough to follow no matter what, it would be the dip of her waist and the swell of her hip.

#47 – **Valiant**  
"Oi, what're you two doing to the poor boy?" Isabela shouts above the din of the Hanged Man, shooing the girls off and throwing Carver a wink; if anyone deserves a restful drink alone, it's the sweetheart in Grey Warden armor.

#48 – **Virtuous**  
"I close my eyes and sometimes say a little prayer," Sebastian explains when Carver asks him how he manages to not hurt his chaste self every time Isabela leans over, "It's the most we can do, I'm afraid."

#49 –** Victory**  
Removing Isabela's boot takes longer than it should, but when Carver lets out a triumphant whoop and tosses it aside, she can't help but thank the Maker for showy cobblers.

#50 – **Defeat**  
With Meredith nothing but a statue and three dozen templars bending the knee to his sister, Carver might have come up with something more noble to do or say beyond grabbing Isabela around her waist and kissing her, but he couldn't be bothered to wait a moment longer; she was glad he didn't.


End file.
